He was probably faster than that. He did himself no favours in the speed stakes by employing that steepling length which, as a hallmark of his bowling, was eclipsed only by the consistency with which he held it. Although greatly unsettling (chiefly for said metronomic steadiness), it completely duped the speed gun.

I do not know how closely you study, and how much credibility you give to, that delightful piece of technology creatively dubbed "Hawkeye", but it shows (with what may be called conclusiveness only if you believe in its fabled accuracy) that a cricket ball, when trundled, loses an enormous amount of pace after hitting the deck.

This always seemed the case with Glenn McGrath. Had a he bowled a foot or so fuller, he might not have been as great or as temperate a bowler, but he would have maintained his status as a genuine speedster for far longer than he did.

Still, whatever the facts about his speed and how much of it he lost after his deliveries introduced themselves to cricket wickets, he hardly deserves mention in a thread devoted to medium-pacers.

If you are going to claim fast-bowling honours for Tait, you really ought to do the same for Dale Steyn, Morne Morkel and Mitchell Johnson. The last-mentioned often eclipsed Tait's speed during the recent Test series with India.

Annoyingly, in the case of Shoaib, I am forced for once to agree with the odious bond21. The Rawalpindi Express has been as inconsistent speed-wise of late as he has been inconsistent temperament-wise throughout his career.

Some of these, of course, were not exclusively medium-paced and, to make matters worse, not Pakistanis either. Nevertheless, they were comfortably better than your offering when they were cultivating the medium-paced stuff.

Orright, but that hardly refutes my contention that he is grossly inconsistent. He was often well down into the 130s in that same series.

Agreed, he was actually quite bad in the series by his own standards. Hasn't actually been consistently fast and devastating since the England series in 05 (yes I know I mention that series a lot, and no its not the only series I've ever watched).

I do not know how closely you study, and how much credibility you give to, that delightful piece of technology creatively dubbed "Hawkeye", but it shows (with what may be called conclusiveness only if you believe in its fabled accuracy) that a cricket ball, when trundled, loses an enormous amount of pace after hitting the deck.

Quite irrelevant, as true as that is, because the speed guns measure the pace of the ball out of the hand.

Rejecting 'analysis by checklist' and 'skill absolutism' since Dec '09